Royal Pizza West End — Restaurant in West Jasper Place

Tonight I was meeting a friend at this restaurant, and it was hands down the most embarrassing, humiliating, and ridiculous experience I have ever had. To say that I will never go to this restaurant again is a mild understatement. I arrived 15 minutes early, only to be completely ignored by the hostess/waitress. This was fine, as I was early, so I just waited in the entrance. In the meantime, around 12 people came in and were seated... again, not a problem, as my friend had not yet arrived. When he did arrive, the hostess, who had seen me arrive 15 minutes earlier, was apologetic that I hadn't been seated yet, but I told her it was quite alright, as there were lots of tables still available. We were sitting at our table at exactly 6:01, and the waitress arrived shortly after to take our drink order. Within a couple more minutes, she was back to ask us if we were ready to order... at this time we were looking at pictures on my phone, and my date said that we weren't. She was about to go, and I said that I would like to order a salad. She told me that I would have to wait to order it all together with our main course. I said that I just wanted to start with a salad, as it usually takes me a long time to eat, and I know that their entrees arrive fairly quickly. She got very snippy, and said it didn't matter (what I wanted!) that she takes all of the order at one time. When I explained that I wanted to eat my salad first, this waitress, Jessica, started to unravel. She immediately got hostile and defensive, telling me that this was how she did it, and that I was being rude. She told me that she was very busy, that someone hadn't shown up for their shift, and that she was suffering from a respiratory infection. I was clearly the snapping point for this psychotic lunatic, as she repeatedly told me that I was being rude, and that she was not going to serve us. I am still so completely puzzled by the whole thing, it doesn't even make sense to be writing this right now. By this point she was making a massive scene. She was pointing her finger at me, and kept YELLING at me. YELLING. The whole restaurant could hear her. She stormed off, and very loudly announced that she refused to serve us. Well, I admire the teamwork at this restaurant, as we sat there for 35 minutes, and yes, we timed it... Nobody, I mean NOT ONE employee from this restaurant approached our table. We were completely ignored. As we were leaving, I went to another waitress to get Jessica's name, as well as the name of the owner. I fully intended on calling him tomorrow, although there really is no point to it... a bad review should suffice. Well, Jessica went off on me again, telling me that she had already called the owner and told him (her version, of course, of) what happened. She was again yelling, and two employees were trying to calm her down. She was again accusing me of being rude, and now saying that I had put my hand in her face. (We were sitting in the soft, LOW chairs in the lounge. It was physically impossible, unless I stood up, to have done anything even remotely close to that. Miss Jessica seems to have been utterly confused by this time.) Where I work, I am often asked where a good place to eat is; this has always been the restaurant I recommend... but on principal alone, I will never, ever recommend it again. I hate that I have even wasted this much time and energy writing this, but it was truly the most extraordinarily disgusting experience I have ever had publicly... and the fact that not one employee came to our table after all of that was absolutely unacceptable. They do not deserve...

Now for the most part I don't mind Royal Pizza and this isn't my first time going to this location, it's been a few years though. My Daughter and I tried to order the monthly special pizza and we wanted to substitute tomatoes for onions. Now most Pizza places would do this for no charge at all and some will charge you more only if you substitute for a premium topping. I'm sorry but I'm not going to pay 23 bucks for a tiny 3 topping medium pizza, would have been 21 bucks before the minor substitution. Right there I wanted to leave but we had already ordered our beverages. So my kid and I decide to get the Boiled Spaghetti with Meat Sauce. First bite and my kid said Daddy, yours is WAAAY Better. The pasta was over cooked, mushy and the sauce tasted like over peppered dirt with no-name spaghetti sauce out of a can. I also couldn't taste any meat and the pieces that were in there were so small that you couldn't even notice them offering zero texture to the dish. I would have rather stopped at Walmart and bought a couple Great Value Beef Macaroni frozen pasta's for a buck each as they are a superior product to what we received. Despite the crappy over spicy taste my Daughter choked hers down because she was hungry enough to eat her left shoe. She also went home hungry even though she isn't a huge eater. I lost interest in mine after my garlic toast was gone and left most of it. Meanwhile my kid was almost done by the time the waitress asked us if we wanted Parmesan. I got out the word um and she ran away faster than the kid who pull a fire alarm. The Manager wasn't in to make a complaint. The only saving grace is that the sub par waitress didn't charge me for my Spaghetti which was $12. For that same $12 buck I can get excellent Spaghetti with Hearty Meat sauce, all I can eat bread, Minestrone soup or garden salald and Spumoni Ice Cream at the Old Spaghetti Factory. I am blown away by the crummy food and sub par service. We won't be returning to this location and most likely wont consider others of this franchise. Now I'm stuck being hungry and have to cook despite that we already went out to eat. Booo! Close your doors, I think it would be best for all.

Signed...

I don’t write too many reviews online and probably will write more after this.

I won’t get into the entire scenario but let me give a brief experience I had with Royal Pizza that was handled brilliantly by Michelle or Rochelle, the delivery driver/manager and a follow up call today, the day after by the owner Maddock(hope I spelled that correctly)?

I grew up eating Royal Pizza and I think most people have in Edmonton and Royal was always the place to order from growing up and now into my late 40’s. It’s usually a go-to place, but there can be hiccups down the road nowadays with staff shortages, supply-chain issues and they’ve weathered the storm of Covid pretty well compared to the quality of food and service at other places I’ve ordered from or ate in.

I don’t want this to be a huge monologue of my experience and the history, but, my family is a loyal customers. So, there was a couple of issues with my meal last night and the entire staff was brilliant and immediately corrected the situation!. We all know things can go wrong and miscommunication and the food and hospitality industry is no different. From Michelle/Rochelle(sorry if I got it wrong) front end of staff, the driver/manager, but the coupe de grace and and added surprise was the owner Maddock was his name personally called me today and gave me a full refund and a credit for the full amount of my meal last night.

If that is not hand on ownership taking responsibility and correcting an error that we’ve all made cooking is I do t know what is better ownership and leadership than that. And clearly it’s instilled in their staff with their professionalism and a company that owns up to a mistake, something almost unheard of today!

So, today I take my hat of and salute this restaurant that’s been a family staple for well over 30 years in my family, maybe longer. So, keep up serving great food and service for another 30 + years!!!

That phone call Maddock you made to me earlier today did not go unnoticed and unappreciated. Thank you and you have a great...